Change is chaotic. But it can be sorta beautiful too.

9/52 -Naked? No, thanks.

I know there are people on this planet who are comfortable with being naked.

My SO is one of them. The first time I met him, he was wearing only a towel and that’s because it was the middle of December and he felt a bit chilly. While not a nudist in the modern sense of living in a special community, he’s certainly got a proclivity towards being nude. He’s not self-conscious about it and it actually strikes me as odd when he happens to be wearing shorts while in the house – even weirder is when he’s fully dressed.

He takes off his clothes upon coming inside like other people kick off their shoes.

I, on the other hand, avoid being without clothes as much as I possibly can. I change quickly, I transition from dressed to a towel to the shower and then back again in fifteen minutes or less. I sleep in a minimum of a tank-top and pajama bottoms. I even swim in shorts and a sports-bra style top. Even during sex, I’m reluctant to remove my shirt and if it’s long enough to cover my hips, then I consider it a bonus.

It’s not that I’m hideous or particularly overweight – I’m 5′ 4″ and weight roughly 160lbs, but the weight is all the “right” kind of curves. He says often enough that he doesn’t consider me fat and likes the way I look. That’s great and all, I suppose, but it doesn’t alter the fact that I’m not at ease with my clothes off.

This is coming up, today, because he left the house this morning and instructed me to be naked when he comes back. “Naked?” I asked, hoping I’d misheard him somehow.

“Yes. Naked.”

“. . . like, with a towel on?”

“No. Naked.”

“. . . can I be in bed under the blanket?”

“No. You can be on the bed, on top of the blanket. Naked.” My silence made him raise an eyebrow at me. He eyed the paddle to the side of the bed. “Problem?”

It was 6:30 A.M. and I was too sleepy to fight, but . . . “. . . I don’t wanna be naked . . .”

“I know, but you will be.” And he left.

This is when being his becomes problematic. Submissives – such as I – are supposed to . . . well . . . submit. That’s not an issue for me, usually. I am naturally inclined to be submissive and to “go with the flow,” as it were. Getting his drinks, washing his clothes, going where he wants, even leaving him in control of the finances and major purchases is all fine with me. The second sex gets involved though . . .

I mentioned during the last post, I think, that I’m just not that interested in sex. I like to masturbate, sure, but the mechanics of actual sex just make me feel awkward and uncomfortable. Partly because of the need to be naked during most of it, but also just because I continually worry about doing something wrong.

*sigh*

There are always choices. In this case, I can choose to be good and be naked in 45 minutes, when he’s due home. Or I can choose to be bad and not be naked . . . and end up naked anyway, of course, because if he wants me to be naked then he’ll get me to be naked.

He’s got my permission to force me to be naked, of course. I’m his and it’s consensual even when it’s not – which is always so much fun to try to explain to people. *sarcasm*

Even among those in the lifestyle, I’ve realized that my relationship with him is an extreme that very few can actually fathom. In BDSM, it’s not unusual to find people who identify as being in a M/s dynamic. However, if you start talking to the majority of them, it becomes clear that we have very different ideas of what that actually means. For most of them, it’s a fantasy that they choose to live. One of the first things I ask when someone says that they’re a slave in the BDSM sense of things is whether or not they have hard limits. If they say yes, my next question is whether or not their “Master” is allowed to break those hard limits – for instance, “golden showers” is a popular one.

In every case, but one the person in question said, “Well, of course not. That’s why it’s a hard limit.” And in every case, but three, they didn’t then understand why I started giggling. In my opinion, you’re not a slave if you’ve got limits (which is, incidentally, why I don’t think of myself as a slave, even though He thinks of me as one). I tell myself that I have limits, but in reality, I wouldn’t be angry with him for breaking those limits, because I’ve given him permission to do so by calling myself His.

I’m one of only two people I know who doesn’t have limits – short of dismemberment/extreme mutilation and/or death. He doesn’t usually push me, because I’m lucky and he respects that this part of our lives is only one part of it, but if he wanted to, he could push it.

To me, the question of limits is not a question. I’ve been rereading 50 Shades in light of the new movie coming out and I keep giggling at the concept of a contract and limits and negotiating. It’s outside of my reality and playing like that would actually be more of a “fantasy” to me than the M/s dynamic I’m already in.

Here’s a really good example. I don’t call him Sir or Master. I never have. Not once in six years. He doesn’t require it of me, and I think of him by his first name. I only tend to capitalize “Him” in this blog, because I want to avoid using his name here. He calls me by my name, or pet, or slave – depending on the situation. When we used to go to play parties and munches, everyone was always somewhat put off by this arrangement. They either doubted my “submission” or questions his “authority.” Eventually, the core group got used to it, but it still raised some eyebrows here and there.

Now, if I were to call him Sir or Master, I would consider that part of a fantasy role-play.

I’ve killed half an hour, writing this, but I’m still not sure if I’m going to be naked when he gets home, or not. Decisions, decisions . . .

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Normally, I don’t do direct questions to you, the reader, but in this case, I’m curious about two things and I’m going to go ahead and ask . . .

Are you comfortable being naked? If yes, was that always the case? If no, why not?

If you are in a BDSM style relationship, what do you think about the differences between being a slave and a submissive? Is it a matter of limits, time, semantics, or something else?